am29
Active Member
I read a CP24 article saying that they were discussing adding a fourth stop on the BD extension to STC at the Danforth road and Eglinton ave intersection, any thoughts on that?
That's been extensively discussed here extensively on more than one occasion over the years. Seems like a no-brainer to me - if they don't build it, the 3.5 distance from Lawrence East to Kennedy would be by far the longest distance on the subway system without a station. It's 1.5 km from Danforth/Eglinton to Kennedy station (over 2 km by the time the bus does all the looping to get to the subway station at Kennedy.I read a CP24 article saying that they were discussing adding a fourth stop on the BD extension to STC at the Danforth road and Eglinton ave intersection, any thoughts on that?
I think those comments were generally before the October 2013 City Council approval of about $100 million of SRT life extension to 2023.
The survey of 2,320 people by Mainstreet Technologies found that 53% of respondents approve of adding a fourth stop, at a cost of $100-million to $150-million.
*if*. The Spadina extension fiascos should remind us that stations are more than a blob on a map and a wad of cash.
In 2012, De Baeremaeker and then-TTC chair Karen Stintz suggested replacing the fully funded, fully grade-separated Scarborough LRT plan that was ready to build with a subway extension, saying they’d learned it would cost just $400 million more than the $1.4 billion LRT. To which the skeptical villagers of Toronto said, “Really? Well, let’s have a look at this.”
From there, we learned that it would just maybe need a few carrots from the federal government, some good soup bones from property taxpayers, a dash of this and that development charges, and after an election and a couple years of bitter, resentful simmering, we now have an approved plan for a three-stop subway costing over $1.6 billion more than the original plan. But the subway broth still seems a little thin, so Chef De Baeremaeker is back asking for one little thing more.
The money numbers being thrown around for this is so infuriating... the $3.56 billion number IS NOT comparable to the $1.4 billion number. The comparable number is $2.5 billion. The $3.56 billion number is using escalated dollars, $1.4 is in 2010 dollars.
The LRT number has also conveniently been rounded down to $1.4 billion during this whole debate, before it the cost was always quoted at $1.8 billion. $400 million of it has mysteriously transferred to the Eglinton Crosstown budget, which has now jumped from $4.9 billion to $5.3 billion.
The subway, using 2010 dollars, costs $800 million more. That is also the number they were using at the start, not the $400 million number.
Pisses me of that we keep seeing these simply false articles coming out claiming something that is completely different.
$3.56 billion = Full, escalated cost of subway on opening day including maintenance and demolition of SRT.
$1.4 billion = cost of LRT plan in 2010 dollars. There is no escalated cost available to compare, but it would likely be somewhere in the $2 billion range. Pre Scarborough subway debate, they used a $1.8 billion dollar figure for the cost. They have since moved the Kennedy station reconstruction budget to the Crosstown LRT budget, dropping it to $1.4 billion. The Kennedy station rebuild will also likely cost significantly less now, as it has had its scope reduced significantly with the removal of the SRT underground platform.
$2.5 billion dollars = The cost of the subway plan in 2010 dollars. This is the number that they should be using for comparisons. It is $700 million more than the original budget for the LRT.
I'm not aware of any estimates done in 2010. Estimates have been done in 2013 in 2010$, but which one was done in 2010?I thought the 2010 estimate came with a disclaimer that it could end up costing up to 30% more (in 2010$) since inadequate design work had been done for a proper estimate at that point?